


The Life and Times of a Midhive Criminal

by TheBlackboardMonitor



Category: Warhammer - All Media Types, Warhammer 40.000
Genre: Body Horror, Canon-Typical Violence, Crime, Crime and criminals, Dark, Fantasy Racism, Gang Violence, Gang warfare, Gangs, Gen, Grimdark, Middle Class People in a society with a feudal social structure, Not that Grimdark, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Shenanigans, Start Of Darkness, Totalitarian States, Warhammer 40k - Freeform, criminals, grim
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-13
Updated: 2020-05-14
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:47:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,596
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24164614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheBlackboardMonitor/pseuds/TheBlackboardMonitor
Summary: Glasbo Drokk is not an interesting man. One of teeming billions in a galaxy of only war, he fills his days with monotonous labour, humble pleasures and faith in his God-Emperor. He's not getting any younger, just poorer, sicker and closer to being tossed into the sump hole with the morning refuse and the mutants. In his whitewashed world of midhive almost-luxury in the neighbourhood of Breckside he is bored out of his blessedly ignorant mind. So before he meets his master on Terra, maybe he can live a little. What harm could it do, really?
Comments: 1
Kudos: 3





	1. Breckside Barrels

Thaw came early to Belkan hive. The melt-water flowed through the hive, into reservoirs guarded by solid and silent Rimeguard, the local PDF life-bonded to their noble masters, ever vigilant to anyone who would dare steal the clean water from Belkan's well-bred uphive aristocracy. Utterly dutiful, utterly loyal, utterly incorruptable.

The line to bribe them stretched half a kilometre, but to Glasbo Drokk's delight it was moving quite quickly. He had half a barrel over one skinny shoulder and every bottle he owned dangling from his belt. The woman in front of him was bent double under an ornate bronze pot whilst the family behind him had overturned a bathtub and were squabbling over who's end was heaviest. Emperor willing he would have his water by duskbell, and wouldn't need to do this again until after Sanguinalia. A few chits to whoever was on duty and he gets to drink water no-one else has drunk before him. It was, Glasbo new, stealing. It wasn't his water, it belonged, as the 50 foot scowling statue proclaimed, to her grace the 119th Countess of Brekkside, Lady Ignozia Vanderbrekk XII. In fact according to an enforcer he once met in the Angel's Footsteps he wasn't meant to drink fresh water at all. Some sumptuary law like not wearing green unless you're noble or wearing red unless you're a priest. If it was still the law Drokk didn't feel too worried as the enforcer who told him that was ten metres ahead of him with a dozen plasteel buckets on a pole across his shoulders. 

Drokk took another few shuffling steps forward when he was shaken from his reverie by an arrogant, yelling idiot who was also what passed for Glasbo Drokks only friend.

"Glass! Glass! Coo-ee! Over here! Glass, Glass, Glass, Gla-"

Everyone around them was giving significant looks but Fomoncular Jogun was not the sort of man to care about such things. You could open your door to him trying to pick your lock and he'd tip his hat you'd met on the way to church. He was holding up his own line to shout at him whilst jumping up and down waving a rubber sack. Some complex manoeuvring let Drokk shift just enough to give him a wave, in the naive hope that would make him shut up.

"Glass! Hi Glass! What are you on with now?"

"Getting wa-"

"Getting water! Sorry my man that was dense of me, hey! Hey! You doing anything later!?"

Glasbo kept trying to shake his head in what is the Imperial standard sign language for 'talk later' but all he got was a firm prod in the back with a bathtub for not moving on.

"I'm working today Fojo, look let's just ta-"

"No after work you silly! Let's talk later!"

The lines moved out of sync after an old man keeled over dead in front of Fojo, the people around him were trying to kick him out of the way but he had chained himself to an old Navy barrel eight foot tall and made of plasteel. As Glasbo Drokk pulled ahead of his least hated acquaintance he tried to keep his head down, desperate for people to stop looking at him. That wasn't hard, he wasn't particularly interesting.

> Thought for the day: They who seek comfort seek destruction. 

Breckside Barrels manufactorum primus was the second oldest building in Breckside, after the vent. A granite icon of a cog boasted it's time of construction as 048.M33, whatever that meant. It was itself a barrel, bulging in the middle and a dozen floors tall, its blazing chemical fires spread their suffocating reek over the whole neighbourhood, destroying the entire communities sense of smell. The entrance and the exit were separated for maximum efficiency but a disintegrated bridge back in the blurry past meant there was only one way in and out, so Drokk had to push his way through the last shift to start his own. He wasn't worried though, he had set off from his lodgings earlier than usual today to make sure he wasn't late.

"You're late Drokk." said an electronic drone. Adept Monsour-Beta lowered herself from the ceiling rail on a whirring servo-arm."You will have your wages docked. You have displeased the Omnissiah. Do not do it again." 

Rubbish! Total refuse! He couldn't be late, just couldn't. Yes there'd been a slip on the tram but that had taken two, three minutes tops to fix! Four at most! He pulled out his chrono which hung from a length of fibro-twine and there it was, in big green glowing letters 19:45, early by a quarter of an hour. Looking up at the massive, round clock of the manufactorum floor though he couldn't make head nor tail of what it said. An ancient mess of numbers and three jittering arms in the shape of avenging angels may as well have been high gothic for all he could understand it. Monsour-Beta was, he thought, probably lying, possibly trying to cheat him out of his wages but definitely an absolute Grox's ass of a coggirl. But she was an adept, inducted into the cult mechanicus, and whilst he wasn't quite as easy to replace as the furnace stokers or the pushpullers he would only present her with, at most, an afternoons work if she had to find another skilled turner. 

So he pulled on his blessed mass-produced and ill-fitting safety gear and took up an empty station on line 1. Line 1 was an easy enough line for him. Churning out M36 Lasgun barrels was delicate, yet light, work. Once the lenses were cut actually making the barrel around them was simple, but too much or too little pressure and the frame would crack. Fojo was on the other side of the line, smiling and yelling as he also turned barrel after barrel and sent them down the dragline to the encasement chamber. If he was saying anything relevant, or even if he wasn't, Glasbo Drokk had little idea and less concern.

This was what he was good at. This was what he was meant for. This was also, more importantly, all that stood between him and starvation.

He was good at it though, even he had to admit. In his long, nimble fingers plasteel became supple and soft, easily shaped and bent to his will. For twelve hours a day, six days a week, he was powerful. He was a lord, although his desmesne was a workstation. He was an artist, though his art was just components. He ruled with velvet glove and iron fist, yet his subjects were all pieces of cheap metal and plasteel and his armies were whirring lathes and nameless engines. Sometimes, at church, he heard the preacher preach that pride of all sorts was a sin, except for pride in ones humanity. But Glasbo didn't worry. Taking the raw firmament of the galaxy and making _stuff_ out of it, making use from uselessness or purpose from purposeless, that is what being human is all about, isn't it? Isn't it? Isn't it?

The question rang through Drokk's head. It was bigger than any two words had any right to be. He got this sometimes though, thoughts that wouldn't leave. After level 5 collapsed he went up to take a look. Just for something to do on his day off that wasn't get drunk or do overtime. A chasm. A valley, even though he had never seen one. A rent in the hive that fell into darkness, yet on either side you could see business, streets, thoroughfares and people's homes that now opened out onto an impossible drop. Something truly astonishing, it should've been breathtaking and humbling, and it might have been had Glasbo not been stuck thinking about how if he just pushed that scribe who leaned all the way over the edge for a better look it would be hilarious. 

He hadn't of course. The scribe's life is not his to take, it belongs to the Emperor just like Drokk's does, but he thought about it. He thought about it for weeks. He thought about it late at night when he pulled his pillow over his ears to block out the sounds of his flatmates. He thought about it on the tram as he stared unseeing at scenery he had seen ten thousand times before. He didn't want to, he just couldn't help it.

So he was in a foul mood when he clocked off, received a begrudged and suspiciously light envelope full of Velum chits from Adept Monsour-Beta and stood at the peakside stop for the next tram. Which may explain how he pretended he hadn't seen Fojo trying to get his attention and how now he pretended he didn't see him standing in front of him at the stop. Fojo had left before he had and he hadn't turned around so he'd have no idea Glasbo was here, right? He felt a pang of shame at this, not a very big one mind, because this isn't what a good friend does is it? Isn't it? Isn't it? Isn't it? 

Still, a dribble of mercy soothed Drokk when the tram pulled itself into view through an old bulkhead, pulling itself through the door with it's long articulated legs, clinging to the sheer side of a support wall as it pulled into the stop and opened its doors for the press of bodies. Going on the tram always made Drokk feel better, as a child he had a little toy tram made out of scrap metal he would play with for hours before and after work, so he took a seat next to Fojo and treat him to his best fake smile.

"Fojo! There you are! I thought i'd lost you."

"You'll never be that lucky Glass, haha" said Fojo. Glass realised he was faking his smile and felt even guiltier. "Angel's Tread again eh? They have dancers in on thursdays."

"Sounds pretty swell my dude but thursday's tomorrow."

"No it isn't, it's today."

"No today is wednesday Fojo, remember we got water today? Anyway it doesn-"

"Yeah we got water yesterday you mean, and that woman died remember! Man alive that was grim wasn't it?"

"A little dark yeah, and I think it was a man, but anyway that doesn-"

"So like I said it's thursday."

"Fine it's thursday, anyway as I was sayi-"

"See says thursday on my chrono, honestly Glass you just love an argu-"

"FOJO! SHUT UP!" he said, to more looks and shaking of heads, not his fault this time Drokk he thought, now you're the ass. "Look i'm sorry but you had something you wanted to tell me all day, you know, before you decided it was thursday."

"Well it is thu-"

"Fojo!" Glasbo said, dangerously.

"All right all right Terra's sake i dunno, so right I know exactly what we need to do on our day off this week and you will love it! It's an amazing little cafe down on level 5."

"Is it the one we went to last week that opens out onto the chasm because all that did was make me feel sick."

"Nah mate i'm sorry about that, i've got a much better one this time, it's got all these mirrors and things see."

"I don't like mirrors."

"No like, not in the place you see, but in a big tube you see, so they can, like, uh..." Fojo waved his hands in an effort to explain the mysteries of technology in the 41st millennium and his enviable ignorance of how anything actually worked "pump the light in, sort of thing."

Drokk was severely confused.

"Fojo i'm severely confused, what do you mean? Like, it's a bright cafe? Well lit or something?"

"No man, it's got real light in it!"

"That doesn't help."

"Proper light!"

"Still not helping."

"Light from the sky, proper special light like, not like the bad light we get in here."

At this he waved at a large glow-globe hanging from a chain, which seemed to provide perfectly good light to Drokk and he said as much.

"Oh whatever, come on just come with me? Please? I don't want to go on my own it'll be boring."

"Fine, i'll come with you, but it isn't anything..."

Drokk looked around conspiratorially, which was a waste of time because he felt at least 3 elbows pressing into him from various angles and could only see one side of the tram from the press of bodies. For the sake of tradition he still lowered his voice to a whisper and leaned close.

"It's nothing, weird or, illegal is it Fojo?"

The taller man seemed to look genuinely shocked.

"No Glass it ain't, you know i'd never get you involved in that sort of thing. I love you man."

"All right, i'm sorry. I'll come with you." Drokk said as he went to join the ooze of bodies at his stop "and I love you too!" he shouted after Fojo.

Fojo waved from the tram window as Glasbo climbed the ladder to the hatch which led to a corridor which led to a flat which curtains and boards had divided into 16 separate enclosures. Opening the cupboard to find his noodles missing he stole someone else's and brewed a cup full of Soylens Vert flavoured soup. Stepping gingerly over a sleeping mass of bodies that represented his neighbours, the Halcoons, and ducked through the faded pink curtain that represent his entire private world. two metres long by one metre wide by two metres tall. his clothes were in a chest on the floor whilst all his material wealth was on a shelf by his hammock. A leather box full of keepsakes. an Icon of St. Iblis the Instructor and half a book he fished out of a refuse tin. It was an old munitorum manual on lasgun maintenance and it gave Drokk some comfort to better know more about the devices he spent all that day helping to make. Ignorance is blessed but knowledge about your work is permitted, isn't it? Isn't it? Isn't it?

His mind rang as he ate his soup.

Isn't it? Isn't it? Isn't it?

He turned the pages of his book, eyes scanning words and diagrams without taking anything in. 

Isn't it? Isn't it? Isn't it?

He lay back on his hammock and stared at the thin metal of the ceiling, above which he could hear his upper neighbour snore in disharmony with Mr. Fulk, a different flatmate.

Isn't it? Isn't it? Isn't it?

He clamped his pillow around his head, curling into a ball of tension, blocking out every noise except the one in his head.

Isn't it? Isn't it? Isn't it?

He did not sleep before he had to leave for work again.


	2. Corpse Looting Is Good For The Environment

Drokk's eyes were sore. His head was sore. His skin was much to tight around his neck and ribs. He saw the world as if he was drunk but felt it stone cold sober. After an eternity of lying in self-pity he swung himself out of his hammock and into a heap on the floor.

"You alright there Mr. Drokk?" said Mrs. Fulk, his neighbour for the last twenty five years. "Not had too much to drink again have we?"

"No Mrs. Fulk" he tried to say, what actually came out was something more like "Nom'ezf" and a hacking cough.

"Right, you just stay right were you are sweetie."

He protested this as unnecessary, dusted himself off and walked briskly out the door when a chubby hand holding a mug of hot water pushed through his curtain, breaking his hallucination.

"Drink up dear, you're having a funny turn again I reckon, our Igan always used to have a funny turn oh at least twice a week bless him. You remember Igan, he got drafted for the guard? His wife is getting on very well these days you know."

Drokk drank deep letting the rambling neighbourhood gossip wash over him in what will be the closest he'll get to a shower today. He knew all the gossip already of course, but it didn't do to interrupt Mrs. Fulk. She could be very generous if you were the right sort of person. Personally, Glasbo didn't want to know what she was like if you were the wrong sort of person. 

"-and young mistress Halcoon started just after St. Beaton's day, at the cleansing guild with her daddy, oh she looks so cute in her little overalls! Now it's her sixth birthday after Sanguinalia and I know your very busy so I just put a chit from you for her gift." she took my empty mug off me and gave me a sympathetic look through a gap in the curtains, "Don't worry about it sweetie you can pay me back whenever."

"I'll pay you back tonight Mrs. Fulk, I need to get going." he staggered in what was roughly the direction of the door and managed to open it on the third try.

"Yes it's a pull love you do remember, will you be alright Mr. Drokk?"

"I'm ripe as a ploin Mrs. Fulk, have a nice day."

"You too!" She had got herself up on her crutches and made her way over to the sink when she yelled after him "Oh, and it's your rota today, you forgot last week but we didn't want to say anything because you were having-"

"A funny turn. Thank you Mrs. Fulk I'll do it now. Sorry."

She said something about how his apology wasn't needed but by that point he was already jogging down the corridor. He had a lot to do today and he was realising that being exhausted wasn't going to cut it. The sooner his body could get that message the better because it seemed to vehemently disagree. He took the ladder down a few rungs and swung to the ground level where he gave a silent prayer to the Emperor that he'd lost all sense of smell. 

Ten thousand people lived in this hab-block and they shared a single massive pipe that ran straight down the middle to take their refuse away. Once upon a time it led all the way down to the sump pit but some hivequake a few centuries ago broke that particular luxury. Now the refuse was redirected down into high sided carts that a person could just about drag forwards with only a small amount of spillage. These had to be emptied every few hours and every room in the hab' had a rota to make sure the work got done. Someone must've covered him last week because he wasn't knee deep in it but that was cold comfort. Taking the bar of the cart in his hands he planted his feet in something not quite as soft as the rest of the floor in here and pulled with all his skinny might. It didn't budge. He pulled again and saw that this time the wheels turned, skidding on the muck, totally stuck on the loose slime. 

This was no good. No good at all. He was 'late' yesterday if he's actually late today he doesn't know what would happen. All he needs is something solid, something grippy he can feed under the wheels. It can't be that hard can it? The hive was full of rubbish! A fevered look around him though failed to present any handy bits of scrap metal or chunk of fallen masonry. The bluebird of mindless panic had just started to chirp when Drokk saw the Emperor save him once more, this time in the form of a pile of abandoned jackets dumped in the gutter that stopped this refuse spilling into the street. That would do! One in each hand he slowly fed them under the wheels as he pulled and centimetre by centimetre, then metre by metre, the cart sloshed and skittered out of the midden bay and down the road. 

Now it's ten minutes to the sump pit but that's unladen. Let's say it takes him thirty, call it twenty-five, then he's got another twenty five minutes to- No I don't, Drokk thought, because it'll be ten minutes back too. Alright then he'll have fifteen minutes to eat, shave, pay the rent and still be on time to make the tram. How long to wash though? No time to wash. But I want to. No time! But I won't be allowed to pay the rent if i'm covered in shit. Damn! Fine! Have a wash, then eat, shave and pay the rent. You won't be able to do all four of those. Shut up brain! Hey I'm not the enemy here, you've got to pay the rent and to do that you need to wash. Fine, then we don't shave. That won't be enough time. Then we don't eat either, happy? 

"People will think you're mad if you keep talking to yourself you know."

A woman in a purple robe smirked at him as she gingerly stepped around the babbling lunatic and his cart full of human necessity.

"Oh uh, sorry I uh" well done. Very smooth. 10/10. 

That was fine. He was at the sump pit now, his internal argument having made twenty minutes feel like two. He pulled the cart around and tipped it over the lip of the hole as hundreds of other hivers did the same all along it. the sump pit was a sinkhole that before level 5 collapsed was the only way to dispose of unwanted things. It supposedly went all the way into the sump, deep beneath even the underhive and the disused mine-shafts of the first colonists on Belkan. Glasbo was sceptical of this. Oh people talked about how once upon a time Belkan was a ball of rock without even a single spire or pit dug into it until the first humans came and tamed it for his highness on Terra but that's ridiculous. People can't live outside buildings. They'd suffocate or freeze to death almost instantly. The hive must've been here forever, it's the only possible explanation.

He nodded at a young woman to his left who had her own wheelbarrow she was emptying into the pit.

"That's not a lot you're dumping there, quiet week?"

"Oh no, well I just gave birth."

"Congratulations! What's their name?"

She tipped the barrow up and let the bundle of rags fall into the hole, it gave a wail as it went.

"Oh I didn't bother with a name. Came out with six eyes you see."

"Oh well, better luck next time eh?" 

They laughed about that on the way back until they parted ways at the corner of Shame street and Thawton avenue. He managed to get back a little quicker than he expected so when he turned up at the Supervisors office freshly scrubbed a healthy chemical stained light blue he had hoped it would be a short wait. With any luck he'd drop off the 20 chits he owed and still have time to force down a ration bar before work. 

He was understandably upset then, when he turned a corner to see a crowd all gathered around the supervisor's door muttering like an angry generator. He sidled up to someone in gaudy pink and blue leathers to ask what's going on. It had gone like this. At some point while Drokk wasn't sleeping someone had nailed a memo to the door of the supervisors office. The first person to come across it was Big Londo, who went to get his mate Nal who could read. Nal said it was some memo from the office of Lady Breck that the rent had gone up from 20 chits a day to 30 chits a day per adult, with another 5 chits per child where before they were free. Upon hearing this Big Londo, who was a scrap breaker who made 30 chits a day six days a week and had five kids to feed, in the words of the gaudy gentlemen 'threw a bit of a wetty'. He tried to beat the supervisor over the head with his own electro-cane and ended up being shot by a passing rimeguard. Now half the tenants on this floor were trying to, with every effort to appear non-violent, beg for the rent not to be put up. The supervisor had for his part slammed the door in their faces and not come out since 17:00. 

Glasbo turned to look at the body of Big Londo with his family weeping around him. For a moment he was tempted to help him but then his internal calculator caught up with the conversation. 

30 chits a day. He earned 40 chits a day but like the late Big Londo only worked 6 days a week. He could get overtime but that's not reliable, so he had 240 chits a week. Before he spent 140 on rent, 20 on transport and 40 on food, leaving 40 to get drunk and hang out with Fojo. But now it would be 210 chits a week rent, still 20 chits a week for the tram and then just 10 left for, well, everything else. He had about 100 chits stuffed here and there for emergencies but that wouldn't last.

Glasbo Drokk realised, with that slow, dreadful sense of seeing the meteorite getting bigger and bigger, that he was going to starve to death unless he got a raise, and fast. Starve. Starve. Starve. 

He could see himself, waning from skinny to thin to emaciated to dead. He could feel the hunger he already felt grow and grow until a red hot sword was stuck in his belly. Oh no. This can't happen. He's a skilled worker! A champion Barrel turner! He shouldn't starve to death! Not like these idiots, those dumb muscle idiots who are just servitors with less surgery! He doesn't deserve this, he doesn't deserve to starve. Starve. Starve.

But that's how it's always been hasn't it? Hasn't it? Hasn't it? It's not fair? Well hey life isn't fair. Why shouldn't he starve if half the people in this building are going to?

Half the people. At least. Mrs. Fulk, one legged and relying on her husband to live, who still did her best to look after everyone. The Halcoons, a young family who work different shifts to him but never once complained when he trod on them by accident. Gilly and Golly, the twins who always stole everyone else's food but sometimes came back with a bag full of real meat for everyone to share from, well who know's where? Ignozia, Velter, Boglinsop, Mekki, Grendle, Poffton, all dead. He'd be the last, he had no kids and he had a skilled job, it'd be him. All alone. In their flat. Starving to death. With only their bodies and his thoughts for company. All dead. All alone. All dead. All alone.

Sod that! He would, he would do something damnit! This is ridiculous and it won't just be him who thinks so. He can get someone to help, someone important. Preacher Jom, he's a champion of the poor. Maybe the enforcers. Maybe some of the friendlier rimeguard? Heck he'd go to Adept Monsour-Beta and beg for her help if he needed to. He was not going to starve to death unless the Emperor himself told him to!

This grandiose decision came as he realised, with no small amount of surprise, that he had turned on his heel and was walking away from the crowd, his rent money still in his pocket. He would go to work he decided, talk to other people, see if he can't get a plant together. No good setting out on his own, he'd only muck it up.

>   
> Thought for the day: Do not die easily until the Emperor has given you permission.  
> 

He slipped past the Adept without issue and managed to get Fojo cornered in the privy.

"Right, Fojo, I need your-"

"Not interested."

Drokk let his mouth hang open. A lack of chin gave him a look rather like a fish when he did this but he didn't know that.

"What's wrong?"

"Oh nothing. Nothing's wrong Glass everything is just _Ploiny_."

"Fojo come on, talk to me mate what is it?"

"Where were you last night?"

"At home, you know where I live."

"Oh lovely" said Fojo, "just lovely, at home. Well do you want to know where I was?"

Drokk was already tired of this game and increasingly aware of how suspicious it was that the two of them were in the privy together for such a long time.

"No not really Fojo I don't see the poin-"

"I was in the _Angel's Tread_ , where you said you'd be. You said you'd come with me. I was all alone. You were even on the tram with me when we made that plan, I was yelling and waving after you to try and get your attention but you just waved back like a bloody idiot!"

Oh no. Oh shit. He had done that. He had said all that.

"I didn't do that! I didn't say that!"

"Yes you did! It really annoyed me you know, like, it's not that hard to keep your promises Glasbo."

Oh crap he used my real name. This was bad. Very bad. All thoughts of rent and hunger dissipated in front of the much more pressing concern of my friend being mad at me. 

"Look, I'm sorry Fojo. I am. I was just..." He shouldn't. He couldn't. He did. "I was having one of my wobbles."

That was a dirty move and he knew it. It was underhanded and cruel to use that against him. It worked though, his face softened immediately and guilt replaced indignation. 

"I'm sorry Glass I didn't know."

"No that's alright. It's alright Fojo. You weren't to know. Let's just, move on okay." He was keen to move on, not just because he was manipulating his best mate."Have you seen about the rent going up?"

"The rent?"

"Yeah, her grace Lady Breck is putting the rent up by half."

"Oh! You had me worried. Half a chit is nothing at all man, why you so worried?"

"Not half a chit, half it's total. It was 20 now it's 30."

"Ha!"

"I'm not Joking."

"I know It's just hilarious they'd think I'd pay that."

Drokk was not for the first time very confused.

"Fojo, I'm very-"

"You didn't know that? Aww man I thought you were smart!"

"Wait what? You thought I was smart?"

"I haven't paid rent in years."

"You really think I'm smart?"

"I just slip my super a could chits to look the other way, as far as her ladyship knows no-one lives in Hab-block 411-b"

"Why would you say I'm smart? I'm not smart."

"Glass."

"Sorry. That's some real good law breaking my man but I don't think my super would go for it."

"Well, no maybe not. It isn't for everyone." he shrugged, "Everyone has their price though, even if it ain't in chits."

"You think I should sleep with him?"

"Sure why not. Then come back here and we can think about how to pay your rent."

"You're hilarious."

"Thanks, I try."

Glasbo sighed. He obviously wasn't on to a winner. Ah well, onto Plan B.

The two men left the privy one after the other. Glasbo first then Fojo, so when Adept Monsour Beta rounded on Fojo Glasbo was already half way round the corner whistling and looking busy.

"A word Mr Jo, about these bathroom breaks you've been taking. In my office."

Drokk spared a glance over his shoulder to watch Fojo disappear up the stairs after the suspended techpriest, not needing to watch his hands as he began turning steel into combustion chambers for a Chimera engine. He couldn't hear his whistling over the machines whirr and the foundry's bellow but he didn't need to hear to feel his belly protest it's abandonment. He hadn't got anything to eat this morning after all, it would be at least 11 hours before he could grab something. Not the longest he'd gone without food but longer than he'd like. Ah well, can't be helped. He started recounting the prayer of blessed sustenance and got all the way up to the catechism of the penitent glutton before Fojo joined him at his elbow, eyes thundering and jaw working like a turbine. Drokk thought it best not to bother him, and turned back to his hunger and his work.

>   
> Thought for the day: Hunger is cured by feeding the soul, not the body.  
> 

It was the end of the day. He had 40 chits left in his pocket once he picked up his wages and a 'rat' on a stick from greasy Blims the street food vendor. Not real rat of course, not at that price. Probably sump weasel or pipe eel from the texture but hey it was hot and he was hungry. He got off earlier than his usual stop, after promising Fojo he'd meet him later for a pint at the _Angel's Tread_ , a promise he was determined to keep today no matter what. He had an errand to run first though. If public interest wouldn't sway his supervisor and the criminal evidence had no advice he would have to turn to a higher power.

"Father Jom! How are you this day?"

"Ah master Drokk, how nice for you to pop by! Just grab this end there's a good chap. Yes I'm well thank you, how are you faring in the Emperor's light?"

"Well, my body is fine." he said grabbing the pointy end of the stake father Jom was carrying and putting it over his shoulder. For some reason father Jom always put him in mind of a hive sparrow, probably his red ragged tunic and his habit of staring at people.

"Good good, only your body though? Hold on a moment young master, just got to, ah there we are-" the stake dipped as father Jom picked up a tin full of promethium. "What of your mind? Your soul?"

"My soul is chastened and fearful father," Drokk said, "my mind however, it is burdened with terrible knowledge."

"Ah my child, that is such a shame. You are usually such a wonderfully ignorant person. Tell me, what knowledge is burdening you?"

"Well father, the knowledge that since Lady Breck put the rent up I shant be able to afford to live father."

"Oh?"

"Yes father, I was wondering if you could do me and all the goo-"

"Oh of course my child, of course!"

Glasbo smiled, this was much easier than he thought it would be. With a grunt he hefted the pike into position as two other visiting faithful were piling up oily rags at the base. 

"Thank you father, you are much too kind."

"No no it's quite alright my child, after all it's my job isn't it? Just pass me that length of rope there's a good chap." He had to speak louder now as the muffled wails of the sinner got louder as they drew nearer the pyre. "Just pop around after worship tomorrow and I'll sort you all out."

"Thank you father! I'm sure when a man of the cloth comes with us to explain the matter to them my supervisor will be a lot more amenable."

"Yes yes, wait what?"

"When you come to make our case father. To Lady Breck's appointed supervisor, not to her obviously, I'm not mad."

"Oh my child, I am sorry." as the bedraggled priest talked Drokk's smile remained but the rest of his face went on pilgrimage somewhere far away.

"Why are you sorry father?"

"Because there's been a miscommunication it seems, an unfortunate one. I'm not going to help you speak to your supervisor master Drokk."

They both had to step back from the heat of the burning sinner. The muffled screams had gotten quite loud now.

"I was going to give you some comfort, you and your fellows. Maybe give the emperors mercy to those who want it, sort of thing." father Jom had the good decency to look apologetic at least. "I'm not going to help you argue against your landlady, that's madness!"

"Madness?" Brokk was endeavouring to politely shout over the sinner after their gag had burned up. "Surely putting rent so high we couldn't pay it if we wanted to is what's mad father?"

"Now now my child, watch your tongue. It is not our place to question our superiors." his face drew cruel and he spat out:"an unbroken chain links the most pathetic of us to his greatness on Terra, we must all know our place. If your lady wants to put the rent so high you die it is your place to die! Understand? Anything else would be, well master Drokk, it would be a sin."

He punctuated this final point with a wave that managed to encompass the dying sinner, the chanting choir and the small crowd that had gathered to watch this daily occurrence for want of something better to do. It was, Glasbo had to admit, a pretty intimidating sight. He'd never really noticed before how easily he could be up there himself. He'd just been glad it wasn't him. It was worrying.

"Thank you father, that's a great comfort to me. I shouldn't want to forget my place."

Father Jom softened a little, "Look master Drokk. You're a pious man, never once even been late for my sermons, even when you were ill or drunk, I remember that sort of thing. I suppose..."

The butterfly of hope re-entered Brokk's overgrown garden of despair-

"I suppose you could sleep in the temple for a few nights, while you look for somewhere else to stay I mean."

-and promptly died.

"Oh, thank you. Sincerely, thank you." lied Drokk.

"I'd give you a very reasonable rate."

"Thank you father."

"Got to repair the roof after all."

"Yes father, thank you father."

"There's a good chap. Now run along, I've another burning at 11:20. See you tomorrow old boy."

"Yes father, see you tomorrow father."

"The emperor protects!"

"Yes father, you too."

Well that was a total waste of time. At least he could walk from here to his hab-block, get something more substantial to eat then go out to meet with Fojo. A pint of hangman on one rather old 'rat' on a stick did not appeal, especially now his stomach was full of the icy bowling ball of dread. Things got very slow, as they sometimes do, and he went numb all over. He stopped dodging people as they rushed past. Their shoulders and elbows stopped registering in the big grey cloud that was his whole world. Every sound echoed as if he was pressing his ear to one of the old speaking tubes. Light seemed strange and shifting, bright and dim all at once. That was all a sideshow however, when compared to the main act of his head. He couldn't help it. He knew it was no good, that he still had the better part of a week to figure something out, that if need be he could bunk with Fojo like he did sometimes when he was totally blaggered. He had some savings, some options. A lot of people were in a much worse place than him. It was going to be alright. 

Well why didn't he believe it? He was convinced, as convinced as his name was Glasbo Drokk and the Emperor knew it, that he was going to die. The more he tried to drag his mind off the topic the more his thoughts clung to it. He was going to die. Soon, of hunger, or fire. He was going to die. Someone was going to kill him. He was going to die. A light would drop on his head from the ceiling above and that would be that. He was going to die. 

He barely noticed when he made it to his Hab-block. He completely missed that the pile of coats and jackets was still sprawled by the refuse bays. He was somewhat aware of how his foot caught something soft that had fallen off his cart this morning and he was completely aware when he went heels over head into the pile.

It was a lot firmer than he expected. He tried to stand but something was caught on him, some swearing and shaking failed to release him so he planted one foot on the pile and pulled. With a sound like picking the last bit of 'rat' from between your teeth something popped and Drokk went backwards, a clammy, pallid and armless hand stuck on his sleeve.

It would be expected for someone of Drokk's current mental state to scream, maybe even wail and gnash his teeth. A comedic bout of vomiting would do, in a pinch. At this moment though all Glasbo felt was a detached curiosity. It was not every day you found a hand in a pile of coats and frankly if he was going to die anyway he may as well sate his curiosity along the way. With a sly look in either direction he was glad to find out no-one was paying him any mind. Idiots falling over was a common occurrence in hive Belkan, where if the vents were playing up everything got covered in a layer of brown ice, it barely even counted as street theatre. He turned back to the pile and began rifling through it.

Pretty quickly he found the bloated, blue-red body of a Rimeguardsman, with a scraggy ginger beard and prominent teeth. Now that was rare. Street corpses were usually dross. Common hive nobodies like Glasbo Drokk. Someone important like a Rimeguardsman usually ended up dead in much more interesting places. He couldn't put his finger on it. Although when he tried to he found his finger went straight through his neck, which had taken quite a beating. 

Now he thought about it, he never did ask what happened to that Rimeguard who shot big Londo... maybe some of the local juves took a dislike to this prodnose getting involved where he shouldn't. Rimeguard aren't meant to fight crime, that's what we have enforcers to. Rimeguard have been known to walk straight past a murder in progress and tip their hat to killer and victim. They were the planetary defence force, if you didn't threaten the planet they didn't really care. Or they weren't meant to. This poor young sod was living... was dead proof of why they didn't bother.

He should move him, take him to the sump, ah but it's a long way. He can leave it for the sweepers. Drokk turned to go up the ladder to his flat when a treacherous little thought went through his head.

What do the sweepers do with his stuff?

Well they put it in a sack and bring it back to their bosses, got a little picter to make sure they're honest. Dishonest sweepers have fewer fingers.

So it'll end up on some bosses desk? Lining some rich merchant with another layer of buttercream and gilt silk. Doesn't that feel like a bit of a waste?

Well, yes it does but what can he do about it?

You could use it.

Drokk let go of the ladder and stepped back as if someone had just punched him, blinking and shaking his head from the force of such a new thought.

I...I can't take it.

Why not?

Because I can't!

Why can't you? You'd make better use of it than some rich bossman. Plus, how long will your savings last? Really?

Glasbo's head turned as if against his own will, staring right at the pile of coats.

Well, he's not going to miss it...

A quick inspection of the dead-mans pockets found a wallet, a knife, a packet of flavour dust (ploin) and a tiny of bottle of amasec with a label attached saying 'To Frobbo, love Sleepy x' which made Drokk's heart try and fall out of his trousers. It was sent rocketing up into his throat by the last thing he found. A laspistol. A real laspistol. It had a wooden handle. A wooden handle! This wasn't some ranker, this was an officer! Maybe some noble's son who fancied a life of romance and danger. He certainly found half of that. 

Glasbo felt sick. He looted a corpse. That was a person. Someone's son. He treat it like a chit he found on the street. His hands were shaking and his eyes were streaming with tears but he didn't put the things he took back. He really did need the money and a bottle of amasec and a laspistol would go for a small fortune. He was a looter. A monster. A thief.

He didn't make it to his flat. He broke down sobbing halfway down a corridor. He couldn't bear to face his neighbours right now. They wouldn't understand, they'd be scared of the laspistol. They'd want to know where he'd got it. He needed someone he could trust. He needed-

Glasbo Drokk let his face harden and set his shoulders back. He set off back down the ladder to the tram station. There was nothing for it. He was going to ask Fojo for help again. This time he wouldn't take no for an answer.


End file.
